Every major advancement of African-Americans since the Civil War has been met and opposed by "white rage," says Carol Anderson. Today, she explains how resentful whites have looked to halt the progress of blacks through discriminatory policies, laws, intimidation and violence.

The American Civil War ended more than 150 years ago, but those old divisions still affect us today. There’s perhaps no better example of this than Missouri, a border state claimed by both the Union and the Confederacy. The ongoing struggle to deal with this history recently came to light when the Clay County Museum and Historical Society in the town of Liberty, published an old diary.

As the first woman to represent Kansas in the U.S. Senate, Nancy Kassebaum Baker is a political legend. Today she shares her thoughts on the current state of the Republican Party, locally and nationally. Also, tracing one's lineage is popular, but it remains challenging for descendants of slaves. A genealogist explains the common challenges that can arise, and offers professional advice to ease the journey.

You've probably driven through this cute little neighborhood between Westport and the Plaza, with its bungalows with stone porches. But you may not know that this neighborhood used to be called Steptoe — and it's where freed slaves built new lives for themselves. Hear more about this historic area and the project to collect and preserve its oral history.

After the Civil War, freed slaves fled the South, but not everyone went North. Many thousands came to start farms and towns in rural, western Kansas — a movement that has lasting impact on agriculture and culture to this day.

Out in Western Kansas, not too far from Dodge City, is the town of Jetmore. It’s home to about 900 people, including the Bradshaw family. Young Crystal Bradshaw had a happy childhood there, but one thing was missing, so she set out to solve a family mystery.

She ended up writing an important book about Kansas – before she even went to college.

Kids in the Lyric’s Summer Opera Camp are getting some particularly timely lessons this year, and they don’t all have to do with vocal performance.

The opera they’re learning is She Never Lost a Passenger, which recounts the tale of Harriet Tubman, the slave who escaped to freedom and returned to guide some 70 slaves to freedom using the Underground Railroad network of safe houses.

In Sedalia, Missouri, Marge Harlan spent $25,000 of her own money to build a "slave cabin." While she meant the cabin to honor the courage and resilience of African-Americans, many in the community, especially people of color, have found the gesture problematic and offensive.

We ask, how do we commemorate history? What is the best way to remember a conflicted and painful past? And who gets to decide?

Equality and liberty were Thomas Jefferson’s great dreams—except when it came to slaves.

On Thursday's Up to Date, we’ll discuss the man and his contradictions with historian Henry Wiencek, author of Master of the Mountain: Thomas Jefferson and His Slaves, which examines Jefferson’s changing stance toward slavery.

Kansas City, MO – The image we have of 19th century slavery often comes from the Deep South, places like Georgia and Mississippi, where rich whites owned huge plantations, kept in business by a large, unpaid labor force of enslaved African Americans. But slavery in Missouri, and some of the other border states, looked very different from that.